Ever since the advent of television, the popular and useful programs and their air times have molded people's schedules. Examples such as the six o'clock news (during or after the family dinner) and prime-time shows are abundant. As viewer habits change and the choice of programming (channels) grows, people want to adapt television programming to their schedule, rather than the other way around.
Video cassette recorders (VCRs) have enabled people to tape certain programs at the time they are aired and view them later. The recording medium used in these devices is magnetic tape and is therefore inherently sequential and slow in access. The VCR, although extremely successful as a consumer device, has limited flexibility when the number of television channels increases. Also, the consumer has to remember to program the VCR to record the event. Commercially-available VCR+® technology has somewhat facilitated the process, but still requires tape management, scheduling and remembering when and what to program.
One frequently employed method of viewing television involves rapidly browsing (“surfing”) television channels to search for a program of interest, to watch several programs at once, or to skip ubiquitous commercials. Surfing has become even more popular given the advent of cable and satellite television, wherein many dozens of channels are available for viewing at any given time. On currently available single-screen systems, surfing must be done in real time and as time progresses. In other words, a user can watch one channel and record another channel on a VCR, but the user cannot watch a recorded program and simultaneously record another (unless the user is endowed with multiple VCRs). One of the principle restrictions is that the user cannot go back in time on an arbitrary channel without making a conscious effort to record the channel in advance.
Ideally, a user should be able to walk up to his television set and be able to view, on demand and without delay, everything that he missed during some previous period of time (for instance one day), regardless of channel. Therefore, what is needed in the art is a fundamental increase in the flexibility afforded a user in viewing programs aired over multiple channels. Moreover, what is needed in the art is a way of harnessing the power of digital computers to give the user more power in determining what he wants to watch.